The bright laughing face of the river of song.
But the Plumes of the Lakes all united at last,
The tribes of the Illini proud to destroy,
And down from the northern plains swept like a blast,
And laid siege to the Rock of the blue Illinois:
The gray rock that hung
O’er the billows of blooms,
Where the rain-plover sung
In the dark under glooms,
And cool, cool ran the prairie river!